American Idle

If the present year was between 1978 and 1983 and I were to create music with the intention of depicting my vision of what I believe the future will be like--the future being 2009--my mindbelly would be pregnant with detached, ethereal fetuses generating the most hypnotic tones of aural sex by motorboating their cherubic little fetal lips in the amniotic fluid.

I have reached the conclusion that "sounding like the future if this were the past" is a symphonic quality I hold in high esteem. The preceding statement is fair and honest. Never mind that my vision was/is grossly inaccurate and this music represents a sharp atmospheric contrast to the present reality that is 2009.

2009 was so much cooler 25 years ago.

I possess no unique vision of the future from the past's perspective, however--that future now being the present--which raises the concern that this retrospective foresight has been structured by makeshift memories of quasi-popular films of the era and the soundtracks which accompanied these cinematic ventures.

Does this blemish the artistic integrity of my vision? If so, how much, on a scale of 1 to 10?

Allow me to express this in other terms.

You have been assigned the task of collecting a large bucket of "blue water" from the ocean. But you have seen the water at close range. You know that it is not actually blue although it appears that way from a distance. It is an illusion. As is the self. We all have created malleable memories which comprise our past. Yet memories don't exist anywhere but the self. And once you realize the self does not exist, one has no use for memories and, in turn, the past. Are you following me here? It is a fiction in conceptual thought. It is an internal image which we cannot experience as an actual image. Similarly, the future must be an illusion just like the past in that tomorrow is only a concept and will always be a concept. Tomorrow will constantly be out of reach because time is always Now. Thus, the present is our only reality and, if I would presently like to listen to music that sounds like the future if I were living in the past, what does this mean?

What societal and/or cultural function would this music serve? Would it propagate the illusion or expose the illusion, resulting in some grapefruit spiritual evolution?

Your reports are due Tuesday.

P.E.A.C.E.

I’d like to move far, far away to a distant projected reality within universal consciousness free from the tyranny of style. I’d like to find some new electrons with whom to collide. Know what? Fuck electrons. They’re too negative.

Protons and electrons always cause explosions.

You can see how this is frustrating.

I want to travel to Peru. I want to take a commercial flight to Lima, then jaunt to the Amazon on some puddle jumper operated by a seedy individual with whom I cannot communicate due to the language barrier and engine noise. The plane will groan and jostle aberrantly. I will gaze out the window at the trees below. My brain will perceive this sight as beautiful but I will be unable to appreciate the beauty due to fear of death. I will wonder what people in New Jersey will say about my untimely demise in a prop plane accident over the Peruvian jungle and I will momentarily rue my wanderlust. We will land safely, all things considered. An internal dialogue will ensue in which I call myself a mollycoddle and I will feel stupid for being so frightened. From there, I will board a canoe. There will be a semi-awkward period of silence between myself and the guide paddling the canoe. I will point out a group of large, variegated parrots. He will feign interest and I will question my decision to verbally acknowledge the birds, likening the scenario to a hypothetical tourist’s hypothetical enthusiastic reaction to seeing a McDonald’s on a U.S. highway. It will jive at the time. Later, I will disparage this allegory and regret ever thinking it. When I arrive at the village, I will be given a makeshift mattress and a mosquito net. I will engage in spiritual ceremonies with shamans and drink Ayahuasca. We will speak (through a translator) about opening my third eye. I’m not sure how long I stay. As long as it takes, I suppose.

The next time you see me, I will tell you something like: The universe is an ocean and we are all waves in the ocean. You can’t separate the waves from the ocean; they are the same. We are all one consciousness. It will make total sense to me. You will interpret my words as deep and profound, or so I will believe, but it will not really matter since, at this point, I have transcended the self. I will no longer have any interest in baseball whatsoever, but my eyes will be like mirrors and when you look into my peepers, they will reflect your ego, your attachments and all of your deep-seated fears.

If you tell people this, they will think you are as mad as a March hare. And not just your banal brother-in-law who’s obsessed with status quo, a large percentage of baby boomers, and/or wild-eyed, god-fearing Christians, but people you genuinely trust. So I keep it secret from everyone other than the three or so people whom I already told and received reactions of flabbergast in return. I will research this on the Internet and discover that this shamanistic tourism is big business in South America and there are balls-out websites dedicated to commercializing such an experience with banner ads and everything. I will feel disheartened and commoditized. Instead, I will eat mushrooms and stand at the abdomen of the shopping district with a sign that reads Jesus Saves, but Gretzky Scores on the Rebound. Some people might get pissed, some might laugh, and all parents with small children will most likely clutch their sapling’s hand a little bit tighter as they pass, but I won’t really care since I expect to have transcended the self by this juncture.

Free Verse About Soviet Fighter Jets, Antimatter, and a Young Woman Named Ginger Whose Neighbors Believe She Has Sex with Strangers for Money

I’ve seen heaven in a downed power line
Close to the earth and tangled in the trees
Undulating in the wind like black Chrysopelea
The last fiery remnants of a rogue kite that refuses to leave quietly

Watching butterflies flitter about her live wire hair
Like ghost children poking each other in the sins
Saturating dish towels with the energy raining from her fingertips
Huffing her aura and getting high

She tastes like jazz

She smells like a blind man’s description of his soulmate’s perfume on the day they first met

Her skin feels like self-esteem wrapped in velvet
Soft to the touch

I have bridged the current

Once you’ve been electrocuted, every other human experience is prosaic

Your syrupy fingerprints adhered to my ghost
Ten fiery kites tangled in tree limbs
Smudged across a glass house
Stretching their colors to beyond

I pray for lightning

The perfect storm

People Can Lick Fingers Too

I’m bleeding on the inside.
My brain sweating like a whore in church,
Breathing like a 75 year old man with terminal lung cancer who was just hit in the throat with a ball peen hammer
In trepidation of crossing the Rubicon from the other side.

Every man has a gypsy in his heart.
Every gypsy believes in a place called home.
And so it goes,
An old man’s stories of sea serpents and wolf men,
Ghosts in the attic and monsters in the woods.

Lurid stories.
Folklore, some might say,
Apocryphal anecdotes knitted into the fabric.
The inseam of society
Gorged fatty with greed and greasy denial,
In need of an elastic waistband.
The fabric of society is spandex. Classy.

Every town has a girl who masturbated with a frozen hot dog.

Every shopping mall has a stranger lurking underneath cars
Waiting to slice Achilles tendons.

Did you ever wake up in a bathtub full of ice and realize that your heart had been surgically removed?

I don’t want to be the axe murderer hiding in your backseat.
I want to ride shotgun.

I want to wake up with your hair in my mouth.
I want to make it difficult to get out of bed in the morning.
And not because we hate our jobs.

I want to gift wrap the future and give it to you as the present.

I want to make you express feelings for which no combination of sounds or morphemes have been assigned such a meaning.
I want to inspire you to illustrate the migration of newborn cortical neurons through interpretive dance.

I want to scalp every man who has sold your heart on the black market
And pour road salt on their brains.

I want to wake up with your hair in my soul.

Life Soundtrack Vol. 4

Def Karaoke Jam: Use Your Illusion III


When DJ Tanner released DKJ vs. the World over a decade ago, it was compared to The Catcher in the Rye due to its emotionally poignant, perceptive apologue of one man’s comprehension of his human condition. See my analytical thesis on its impact (albeit edited of controversial content) here. (Look Ma, I made it…my work has been published.) Unbeknownst to us at the time, Tanner would become as reclusive as J.D. Salinger upon publishing his influential opus, silencing his powerful voice and not releasing any new material. Until now. The driving impetus for DKJ’s return is uncertain, though the economic recession and conflict with society have been posited. The UYI3 EP, being released exclusively through free Internet download due to Tanner’s contempt for “The System,” is DKJ’s Chinese Democracy. Stand up. Support the cause.

Drastus: Taphos


Dispel the images of KISS rejects prancing around the forest with swords and sickles. This is not your daddy’s black metal. Drastus is a one-man black metal band from France who produces a harsh, hypnotic attack in this five-song, twenty-minute jewel of white-noise riffing, savage snarls, and apocalyptic ambience. The cascading guitar mantra, “Columns of Decline Part I,” is an eerily beautiful prologue to the relentless blast beats and auditory blood spatter of “Part II,” which hits you square in the kisser like a Mongolian prostitute’s closed fist. You’re taken aback at first. You may find yourself being overcome by rage. But the more you think about it, the more you like it. Oh yeah, that’s the ticket.

Sleep: Dopesmoker


After Sleep received an advance from their record label, the band spent it all on ganja and the creation of this 63-minute long song that manages to transcend any and all limitations of the doom/stoner metal genre. The deal went up in smoke after Sleep refused to rework the massive metal monument and it ultimately led to the group’s demise. The misunderstood masterpiece eventually saw the light of day and, although I have heard about it over the years, I finally invested the time to purchase and listen to it. Imagine if Sabbath jammed out on “Sweet Leaf” for over an hour with heavier-than-Satan’s-balls sludge crushing everything in sight and droning vocals about weed pilgrims melting right into place. Disorienting tones and ethereal riffing that will vibrate your lungs, this is definitive doom. Drop out of life and follow the smoke.

The Mountain Goats: The Coroner’s Gambit


If it’s complex musical arrangements and industrial strength production you crave, keep it moving. If you seek depth of imagery and lyrical complexity, make yourself at home. The Coroner’s Gambit has officially engaged at least three other records in fisticuffs for the honor of being my favorite TMG album of the moment. Literate and emotive godsends like “Jaipur” and “Baboon” are dynamic parables set to rhythm and “Family Happiness” makes me fucking glad to be alive. John Darnielle structures stories in three-minutes like no other and is, quite possibly, the closest thing today’s transparent and corruptible world has to Robert Allen Zimmerman. There. I said it. I know I’ll regret it, but never mind that; get your hands on this album and choke on the tragedy behind the words. Darnielle has created such an overwhelming amount of material throughout the years and this is an excellent starting point before you eventually work your way to The Sunset Tree.

The Living End (cont'd)

It is now time for a psychological analysis of the situational, environmental, social, and cognitive variables associated with spectator violence. I delved into this topic in my longitudinal study of why winning triggers fan aggression. First, we must consider the role of communication in establishing social norms within the crowd. Joking. This is neither the time nor the place for such tomfoolery. Keep your eye on the gentleman in the following video perched atop the traffic light. The next time I saw him, he was clutching his twisted arm and I swear I saw a tibia protruding from his leg. I apologize for the Cloverfield-esque footage.

Spoiler alert: After a group of amateurs' piss-poor attempt to tip over a Grand Am goes awry, one gentleman attempts to smash the back window with a few bionic elbows until the vehicle's large, angry owner interrupts. And it is quite possible that he earns his keep as a custodian. So watch out.

I hope you enjoyed my foray into investigative journalism. Clouds of smoke are still covering City Hall; however, the black cloud which loomed over the city for a quarter-century officially lifted on Wednesday, both literally and figuratively, when the Phillies resumed the rain-suspended Game 5 en route to the ultimate victory. I might return on Saturday with footage from the championship parade, which will undoubtedly make the recent Dracula parade look like a bunch of softheads with papier-mache bat wings strapped to their back, marching around Rittenhouse Square with yellow flags. Excuse me; I'm going to hug a few more strangers and tell them I love them.

The Living End

Finally. After 25 thick, salty years in which the only titles achieved in Philadelphia have been America's Fattest City, U.S. Murder Capital, and the ArenaBowl championship, Broad Street runs red with Phillies fans.

A quarter century seems minute when compared to the 125 years the Phillies have been playing baseball in Philadelphia (which is the longest of any franchise in American sports). During that stretch, the Phils won just one measley championship prior to last night. This is the prime opportunity for kids from the suburbs to cross the bridge, smash storefront windows, and light things on fire. Personally, I feel that tipping over stationary vehicles and setting them ablaze should be reserved for times like when your heavily-favored football team takes a dump on the field during the NFC Championship game and tries to pass it off as the West Coast Offense. Two years in a row. But I digress. These videos do not justly capture the celebration.

(To be continued.....)

Both Trick and Treat Simultaneously

In 1988, German power metal powder keg, Helloween, delivered an intricate yet vitriolic assessment of modern bourgeois culture with the video interpretation of “I Want Out.” Inspired by Rousseau and other 18th Century political theorists, this articulate creation denounces virtue as a synthetic trait born from society whilst addressing the acute awareness of, and regard for, oneself in relation to others as a deeply detrimental psychological deformation. There is also a watermelon. Let us view this theatrical masterpiece together and achieve enlightenment.



Press play…now.

There seems to be an excessive amount of waiters meandering about an empty restaurant. And if they aren’t catering to the feather-haired gentleman in the aquamarine jacket, what the hell are they doing? This place is overstaffed and the manager needs to punch someone’s timecard post haste. The dude at the table is obviously hungry. He opens his mouth and exposes a long, barren hallway; a gateway to his soul perhaps. I hope you’re ready for a wild ride ‘cause there ain’t no turning back!

Nothing like singing while you’re being stuffed into a creepy wooden coffin. He’s probably not that concerned, however, as there is no dirt in sight—nor is there a jackhammer to pierce the abandoned warehouse’s concrete floors—and it does not appear to be an airtight receptacle. I believe a third grader with a learning disability constructed that thing in the shed out yonder. Seriously, once these bullies leave, he could punch through those rickety old planks and run like the dickens.

Okay, in which socket is this guy plugging his electric pink Flying V amongst the desert ruins? And is that a “Frankie Say Relax” shirt under his black trench coat?

0:49 — Yes, I do believe that was a watermelon flying across the screen.

They want out. They want to stick their heads out of the windows of moving cars like Labradors. They want to prance about the flatlands with red capes, jump out of the shallow ends of swimming pools, and stand in front of factories. They just want to live.

Reversing down the hallway. It’s all over. No, wait; we’re going back! Now the band members are circled around Kai Hansen, pushing and shoving him. Wasn’t trapping him in a casket enough? This guy must be a real prick. I told you he’d escape from that paltry piece of shit.

Up the esophagus again. He belches, dabs the corner of his mouth with a napkin, and—really? Again? The first two times blew my mind, don’t get me wrong, but isn’t this just a bit gratuitous?

Fans? Concert scene? What? Why?

3:13 — Yes, I do believe that guy is toting a vacuum cleaner. Look carefully. I thought it was a rubber snake at first, but it is in fact a vacuum.

I swear on all that is holy, if they do the trippy camerawork with the mouth and the hallway again… There’s the watermelon! It breaks! And so?

With those two simple words, Helloween invites the viewer to ponder the notion of a truth inside of the evolving self; a declaration of man's existence in which he defines himself and the world in his own subjectivity, wandering between choice, freedom, and existential angst, yet at the same time recognizing the absurdity of trying to find meaning in the universe. Well played. Kinda makes you want to eat Basmati rice and read The Myth of Sisyphus, doesn't it? Well played indeed.

The World Powered by Fishbulb Energy

If I have ascertained anything from cinema, it is that people in the ‘80s often peered into a mirror, put on a pair of wayfarer sunglasses and snapped their fingers at about eye-level. This mating ritual for teens and young adults— a rite of passage, of sorts— often directly prefaced a premeditated rendezvous with a female. At times, this act may transpire amidst a montage of cool behavior which may or may not reach an abrupt end when the subject’s mother and/or girl over whom he is fawning impede on his privacy while he is playing air guitar in his skivvies. It should also be noted that, during this byzantine decade, it was quite commonplace for a rich father to pull aside his daughter’s middle-class boyfriend, whip out his checkbook and inquire as to how much it would cost to leave his daughter alone, to which the ragamuffin would usually profess his unabashed love and affection for her before peeling away in his Trans Am. High school parties generally consisted of students from every social circle and grade level. Even lycanthropes capable of shapeshifting into wolf-like creatures were tolerated given they car-surf on the roofs of vans and have a wicked jumpshot.

I have learned from— or been influenced by— such outlets significantly throughout the years. I have suckled at the teat of the one-eyed electrical matriarch in the age of mass media overstimulation and it has molded my interpretation of reality. I possess no genuine beliefs, nor am I capable of formulating any unique thoughts or ideas. Instead, I recite hackneyed lines from movies and reference television shows to amuse others. Even commercials are incorporated into my daily discourse. You know me. Yes, you do. I’m that guy at work who quotes Family Guy all day. Still doesn’t ring a bell? Maybe I should talk like Borat, would that help? I am the culmination of all social and cultural stimuli that has preceded me; the product of packaged simulacra sold as a commodity in a Baudrillardian dystopia where all are compared on an insubstantial basis. I am considerably less than the sum of my parts.

So when you arrive home from work ahead of schedule with a bouquet of pastel roses, lilies, carnations and daisy poms for your wife, whom you expect to be worn ragged from dusting the dining room table and cleaning baby vomit from whatever the baby vomits on, and you find the old ball and chain diddling her love button to the image of a greased up Latino gentleman with a horsecock on the computer screen, it is quite difficult for the brain to process. Primetime dramas have partially prepared me for the possibility of catching the wife in bed with the poolboy, but not pleasuring herself to ethnic internet porn most likely marketed toward homosexual men. I stretch my waistband and take a gander at the mushroom in a patch of grass hiding beneath my trousers. How often has she pictured Enrique Iglesias while I played with her nipples? How many times has she finished herself off with a black dildo in the bathroom after we engaged in intercourse? I bet if I opened the cistern there would be some rubber dong modeled after Andre Rison’s penis floating in there. My friend once told me that Andre Rison had to tape his genitals to his leg while playing football because his junk was so big. He was probably full of shit.

What the fuck would Jack Bauer do in this situation?

Unlocking the Seventh Seal

Chinese Democracy will be released on November 23, 2008.

This just in: Chicken Little reports the fucking sky is falling.

There’s an ancient Chinese proverb that goes something like: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me 137 times, go fuck yourself, man; You come here talking that bullshit again, I’ll chop your soul off. How very apropos. After years of cryptic delays, we are now expected to be able to purchase Axl’s 14-year, $13 million opus just in time for the 2008 holiday season...exclusively at big-box chain store Best Buy. Huh?

Do you know where you are? You’re in the jungle, baby. The Geek Squad is totally going to hook up your PC! In the jungle; welcome to the jungle, I wanna see you shopping for DVDs alphabetically by genre.

This marketing strategy hardly sounds odd. Who but Axl would launch a world tour spanning five continents—fragmented from 2001 to 2007—to promote an album which will now allegedly drop just prior to the commencement of 2009? During this strange traveling circus, Axl no-showed a concert date to watch a regular season Lakers game on TV (leading to the second mini-riot and subsequent cancellation of the 2002 North American tour), scuffled with an effeminate, middle-aged fashion designer, and spent the night in a Stockholm jail after biting the leg of a hotel security guard. Meanwhile, Chinese Democracy had become the punch line for any project that has been procrastinated or failed to meet its most tentative deadline. I overslept yesterday and my wife snickered that “waking up is your Chinese Democracy.” Now, after five different producers, a revolving door of band members, and the recent reports that new GN'R tunes will be debuted through a video game and a Leonardo DiCaprio movie, there is an increased likelihood that Chinese Democracy will in fact precede democracy in China.

Regardless of the innumerable cockteases and false alarms, there is literally nothing that will prevent me from purchasing this CD like a schnook immediately upon its release. Even if that means I have to spend my 15 dollars at an underground Al Qaeda bunker in Afghanistan to get it. Even if I have to wait for the FBI to declassify top secret info on the JFK assassination first. That’s how pathetic and brainwashed I am. Nevertheless, I won’t believe this latest ruse until the liner notes are in my right hand, a Best Buy receipt is in my left, and I’m sipping my free Dr. Pepper through a straw with one of the many songs I have already heard blaring from my stereo.

If this actually happens, anything is possible. I shall engage the devil himself in a snowball fight next to the furnace in Hell. Who knows? This can result in a spiritual awakening on a global scale. An acceleration of consciousness shall transpire. Solids and liquids will become plasmas. But if this twisted testament to self-absorption and rock n’ roll amour-propre doesn’t make Appetite for Destruction sound like Jesse & the 8th Street Kidz, the poles shall reverse and the great King of the Mongols cometh again. Or so Axl might believe. Perhaps 12/21/12 would be a more fitting release date.

Season of the Witch

When I die, bury my mortal remains in one of these bastards so that I may communicate with the gods electronically. May I have access to e-mail in purgatory, a global positioning system to navigate my way to Valhalla, and 3G technology to signify that I am plugged in, which, in turn, will naturally impress St. Peter and thus improve my prospects of ascending to Shangri-La . Nothing says “I have absorbed cultural messages and I am able to reprocess and communicate them back” like a touchscreen coffin. I will wait outside the funeral home in sub-arctic temperatures for three days to reserve mine. In death, this product shall validate my life. I can’t wait to die.

Life Soundtrack Vol. 3

The Axis of Perdition: Deleted Scenes from the Transition Hospital


This isn’t just music, this is an experience. A twisted, brainsick experience capable of warping minds and destroying central nervous systems. The Axis of Perdition, a deliciously sinister dark ambient/industrial black metal outfit with the propensity to produce the sonic equivalent of the Rapture in full reverse, has created the auditory parallel to a horror movie known as the Transition Hospital where tortured screams permeate the air while buzzing, hissing, slamming doors, and sometimes unidentifiable noises arise from the darkness. Confine yourself in a pitch black room, put on your headphones, crank up the volume and let your imagination do the rest. Horrific, haunting, and avant-garde, this is my favorite piece of art I have crossed paths with in many moons.

Opeth: Still Life


I saw these symphonic masters of death prog at the Troc recently and, as expected, I was blown away. Opeth mixes metal with acoustic harmonies, ambient euphonies and kinetic shifts, relying less on the blast beat assault mode typical of the genre. Vocals range from grunting death growls to harrowingly beautiful clean singing. Trying to explain Still Life in a single paragraph is a daunting task similar to reviewing Sun Tzu’s The Art of War or Kafka’s The Metamorphosis in a few simple sentences. In other words, it’s really good. So are My Arms, Your Hearse and Ghost Reveries. I popped in some Opeth to get myself stoked for the show a few weeks ago and the discs are still in the forefront of my rotation. Vocalist Mikael Akerfeldt also fronts Swedish death metal supergroup, Bloodbath, which is one of the most bewitchingly truculent and prodigious bands going today. Speaking of which, “Weak Aside” is actually cumming in my ear pussy as I write this. They are so good, they deserve their own write up, so I’m going to cease my gushing now and delay my praise until next time.

Yakuza: Transmutations


Dynamic, eclectic, and experimental, Yakuza blends doom-laden post-metal with progressive midnight jazz, Eastern influences, and elements of world fusion. Any time a saxophone is incorporated into metal, things can get interesting. Case in point: “Egocide.” If King Crimson and Mastodon begat a child, it would be christened Yakuza. And I would listen.

This Will Destroy You: Young Mountain


Sometimes I just can’t get enough of those post-rock instrumental bands. This Will Destroy You’s debut EP is an emotional juggernaut of beatitude that has perfected that whole soft-to-loud thing many of us have grown to love with a wee bit of electronica added to the mix for good measure.

Restavrant: Returns to the Tomb of Guiliano Medidici


I was recently impressed by this alternative country/electro bluegrass duo from the hometown of Stone Cold Steve Austin who are worth checking out if they come through your town. Don’t be alarmed if the drum kit appears to be erected from old Plymouth hubcaps and other people’s garbage held together by vice grips from your seventh grade shop class. That’s just how they roll. The cymbal made of expired license plates is the straw that stirs the drink. Suck on that, John Bonham.

Coffins: Buried Death


Japan isn’t exactly fertile soil where metal artists sprout and flourish (see: Loudness—nice try, guys; thanks for playing). This sludgy doom-death trio’s latest release, on the other hand, is the most imposing force to rise from Tokyo since Godzilla, and the sight of that big lizard smashing skyscrapers isn’t half as pernicious as the pounding rhythm of “Under the Stench.” More predictable than polished, Coffins isn’t reinventing the genre, but anyone who remotely yearns for plodding, grisly old school style metal that emits the fetor of decomposing flesh and 1987, welcome to the holy land. Perhaps my favorite band right…now. Sometimes simplicity begets excellence.